


Like Nothing Changed

by HeartxKang



Category: Day6 (Band)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-23
Updated: 2018-07-23
Packaged: 2019-06-15 01:12:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15401676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HeartxKang/pseuds/HeartxKang
Summary: Jae was the boy next door, the best friend, the secret crush, but then he moved and was none of that anymore. But true love always finds its way back, right?An AU with Jae Park from Day6





	1. 6 years earlier

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first AU that I ever posted, so please feel free to give me feedback! I'm also sorry if there is any typos or awkward sentences (even though I tried to avoid it), english is not my first language :)

6 years earlier

 

“I’ll get it!” I shout as I rush down the stairs to answer the door. On the other side I am greeted by the blond boy with big rounded glasses who lives next door. Jae gives me a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes and by the look of his face I know exactly what’s up. His parents are fighting once again, and like always he flees over to me  and my family who always welcome him with open arms. Jae and his family has been our neighbours my whole life and as long as I can remember Jae has been my best friend. We drifted away a bit when we started high school, he started to hang with the music geeks and I with the writer hipsters, but we thankfully found our way back to each other. We both agreed that a lifetime of friendship is not something you just throw away like that, and even though we don’t belong in the same groups we spend a lot of time together outside of school, especially now when Jae’s parents are on the verge of divorce. 

“You know you don’t have to knock,  _ mi casa, su casa _ you know.” I don’t mention that I know why he is here, because I know he knows that I know and it is hard for him as it is. 

“I can’t just walk right in, who knows what you do when nobody’s watching.”

“Oh shut up!” I say and push him friendly in the side and he laughs as he makes his way to my room.

 

Jae throws himself on my bed, face down and grunts into the pillow.

“Rough day, huh?” I ask and only get another grunt for an answer. I bend down and start searching for something under my bed.

“It’s your lucky day because I have the perfect thing to cheer you up this friday evening.” I place the bag I found under the bed beside his face and he immediately sits up to look through the content. Jae’s eyes widen as he sees the bottle of vodka and the cans of beer, then he looks up at me and smiles widely, making me feel a tingle in my stomach that I just ignore. It has happened often the last months, that my heart skips a beat whenever I see Jae and that I blush like crazy whenever we accidentally touch each other. The fact that I have fallen in love with my best friend scares me so much, and there is no way that I could ever let him know. It would just break my heart when he tells me that the feelings aren’t mutual, nevertheless it will completely ruin our friendship. 

“How did you get this?” Jae holds up the bag with alcohol.

“Brian” I laugh and Jae shakes his head little, he is not at all surprised. Brian is known for dealing alcohol to minors, he’s the dude everyone gets it from. 

“Come on Chicken Little, let’s go” I teasefully say and quickly grab the bag and run out of my room before he attacks me, Jae hates it when I call him Chicken Little. He is quick to follow me down the stairs.

“We’re going out!” I shout to my parents and I don’t wait for an answer before slamming the front door behind me and Jae as we leave the house. 

 

We sit on the grass watching the sun go down as we share the bottle of vodka, while talking about deep subjects. Jae tells me he think his parents are going to tell him they are divorcing any minute, and I give him a hug of comfort. The thing is the hug once again awakens the butterflies in my stomach, and the alcohol in my veins makes me want to confess all my feelings towards him. As I look at Jae in the light of the sunset I think that I have never seen anything so beautiful ever, and I can’t get enough of the view. 

“Why you look at me like that?” Jae says and I realise I have been staring at him and I feel my cheeks heat up. 

“We should get back.” Jae sighs and gets up. “My parents are probably wondering where I am, like they care.” 

I nod and also get up, but as I do the world starts spinning. Jae is thankfully quick to support me and I start to giggle for some reason. 

“You’re such a light drinker” Jae teases me and I am too dizzy to even answer him. We start walking back home and I cling on to Jae for support, because I am too drunk to even walk by myself, and besides it’s an excuse to be close to him. Before I know it we are outside of his house, and he sits me down on his porch. 

“You’re parents will kill you if they see you like this.” he sighs and looks at me, contemplating what to do. “I guess you’ll have to sleep at my place.”

“You’re such a good friend” I giggle and look at the boy, who in my eyes is the most beautiful I’ve ever seen. The butterflies in my stomach are wild and once again I want to confess my feelings towards him, it doesn't matter that it might ruin our friendship, I just want him to know. Because maybe then he will tell me he feels the same, and then he might become my boyfriend and that’s all I want in this moment. It’s impossible to suppress the feelings any longer, I have to let them out.

“Jae, I have to tell you something, I’m in..” I start but don’t get any further before I get up and rush to the bushes next to me, making it just in time before I start throwing up. Jae is quick to follow me, holding up my hair for me, just like he has done so many times before. 

  
  


When I open my eyes in the morning the first thing I notice is the banging headache I have. The second thing I notice is that I am in Jae’s bed, but there is no Jae to be seen. I sit up, start to search for my phone and that’s when I hear Jae’s mum shout something, but I can’t make out what she said. Jae’s dad isn’t late to respond by shouting something back, and the fight has started. Poor Jae, is this what he has to live with, no wonder that he comes over to my house every time. The door to Jae’s room is carefully opened, and Jae peeks in. 

“Oh, you’re awake.” he says with thick voice, and I understand right away that something is wrong, something more than just his parents arguing. 

“What’s wrong?” I ask, while he walks over to the bed and sit down next to me. Jae doesn’t say anything, he just sit with his head bent down and it’s not until the first tear hits the bedsheet I realise he is crying. 

“Hey, Jae…” In an attempt to comfort him I put my arm around him, which makes him cry even more. 

“T-they are, are getting divorced” he sniffles. “But that’s not the bad part, the bad part is that my mom has gotten a new job and I’m moving with her,  to Denver. I have no other choice.” 

At first I don’t understand Jae’s words, they make no sense to me at all, he can’t move?! My best friend since forever can’t move so far away from me, he cannot disappear out of my life like this. The tears start build up behind my eyes, and I don’t even try to fight them, I just let them roll down my cheeks. Jae hugs me and we cry on each others shoulders, both upset over what’s going to happen, and how there is no way for us to stop it. How life is so unfair that something like this is going to split us apart. We do everything together, and never spend more than a week apart from each other. Whenever something happens Jae is the first person I want to tell, no matter if it’s something good so he can celebrate with me, or if it’s something bad so he can comfort me. 

“When are you leaving?” I manage to ask once we calm down a bit. 

“In about a month.” Jae whispers.

“Then let’s make the best out of the time we have left.”

 

The last month with Jae flies by, we spend almost everyday together, doing stuff like getting drunk at house parties someone at school throws when their parents are out of town, to just lay in my bed staring at the ceiling not saying anything to each other. One day we take a sightseeing tour of LA, the city where we have grown up and discovered together. Another day we visit all our favorite coffee shops all in one day, getting so high of the caffeine we go crazy, shaking like leaves in the wind. We just try to have as much fun as possible, keeping ourselves occupied to not think about what’s to come. Everytime we see each other I think about confessing my feelings again, before it’s too late, but everytime I’m about to something stops me. I’m not sure why, but I think it’s my subconscious that knows it’s not a good idea. Jae has never shown any interest in me that way, so the chance that the feelings are one sided are quite high, and that would just totally ruin our friendship. Then there is also the outcome that Jae feels the same towards me, witch might even be worse, because he will soon be gone. He will move hours away from here, and sure we can talk over the phone and text, but it will not at all be the same thing as seeing each other everyday. So to be sure not to ruin anything, I decide to keep my mouth shut, to keep the feelings inside of me, thinking it’s for the best.

 

When Jae eventually disappears I regret everything about not telling him the truth. It’s way too late now and I only have myself to blame. Trying to convince myself it was or the best is hard, when I’m not actually sure that is true. Jae and I try to keep in touch, and for the first three months we actually succeed, but then something happens. At first it’s a few missed phone calls, a couple of texts that don’t get answered right away, but eventually they turn into no calls or texts at all. Life got in the way, and it was hard trying to keep our friendship alive when nothing was like before. Sure, me and Jae were the same, but not seeing each other every day, not being able to just run next door whenever you were bored, no more family dinners, it changed everything. Nothing was like it once was, and maybe it we had tried harder we could have made it work, but maybe it was meant for me and Jae to grow apart, at least that’s what I want to believe. 


	2. Now

Present 

 

I scan the room, hoping to see something that might catch my attention. All my eyes see are drunk people dancing offbeat in a large room at a party, and I don’t understand at all why I am here. Parties are not really my natural habitat, especially not frat-parties, and especially not the ones that start off the semester. To be fair my last year at college just started and I thought I should try something new, but coming here wasn’t the best decision I’ve made in my life, I’ve got to say. I look around again, not sure why because nothing has probably changed in the last minute. Suddenly someone catches my eye, I can’t be, could it..?

“Chicken little, is that you?” I say as I grab the shoulder of the blond boy in front of me. He turns around and in shock looks at me with widened eyes through his round specs.

“Oh my gosh!” He gives me a big hug. “It’s been years!”

I smile widely as I follow Jae out to the garden where the party isn’t quite as wild. We sit there and talk for the rest of the night, catching up on all that has happened since he moved out of the house next to mine 6 years ago and of the state, and I never saw him again. Apparently Jae transferred schools for the last year, and hence why he ended up here. He still looks like chicken little and he still gets just as annoyed with me whenever I call him that. We talk old memories about how he took care of me the time I got too drunk and ended up throwing up in his bushes, and how he always escaped to my house whenever his parents fought before they got a divorce. Jae was my childhood best friend even though we didn’t hang out with the same people at school, but we always had each others backs no matter what and maybe that’s the reason I started to fall in love with him about a year before he moved away. I never confessed my feelings towards him, and it’s something I regretted but meeting Jae here might be a sign of some sort? As we keep talking the night through we get closer and closer to each other, it might be because of the alcohol, but it might be because of something else as well… Even though it has been 6 years I still felt a tingling feeling in my stomach when I spotted Jae in the crowd, and the thought of how he made the butterflies in my stomach come alive years ago makes my cheeks heat up, so the feelings for the blond boy I thought went away years ago might still be there? Or maybe it’s just the alcohol talking, but either way, he is here with me right now.

 

“Jae” I mumble as I have laid my head on his shoulder. “I used to be in love with you, and I think I still am.”

“Oh shut up, you’re just drunk.” Jae giggles, clearly drunk as well. “You still can’t handle your alcohol?”

I sit up and look him straight in the eyes, those beautiful eyes and before I know it our lips touch. It’s like we both have unknowingly been craving each other all these years, and now that we finally have tasted each other we can’t get enough. He is sweet from the punch we’ve been drinking, and salty from the chips we’ve been eating. I press myself against him, wanting to get closer and no matter how close we are, it’s not enough. My hands through his hair, one of his hands behind my neck and the other one on my back.. Hungry, passionate, fearless. Everything around us disappears and the only thing that matters is us. Jae and I.

 

Later the same morning I lay on his naked chest under the covers of his bed, just listening to his heartbeat, and him playing softly with my hair while we watch the sun rise outside of the window. We’re still damp from previous activities, our bodies sticking together, making us even closer to each other as we try to take in as possible of the moment. The moment after we became one, and nothing had ever felt so good. Maybe it was because all the time we spent missing each other. Or maybe because of the feelings we didn’t know we still had for one another. Or maybe because we were too drunk to feel something else. Whatever the reason may be, it doesn’t matter, nothing matters anymore but that I am here with my first love, after years of being apart, not knowing if he even ever liked me back.

“You know, I was in love with you back then” Jae whispers into my hair, barley so I can hear it.

“Then why didn’t you say something?” I whisper back, afraid if I talk any louder the calm around us will go away.

“Why didn’t you?”

I roll off Jae’s chest, changing my position so I lay next to him with my face right next to his.

“I was scared.”

“Yeah, me too.” He looks me straight in the eyes before leaning in and kiss me softly on the lips. “But I’m glad we finally are together.”

 

We do stuff like any other couple, coffee dates at our favourite café, movie nights at his dorm whenever his roommate Dowoon is out, walks in the park at night. We spend so much time together, making up for all the time we lost the past six years.

“Don’t you ever get sick of each other?” Dowoon one day asked as he accidentally walked in on me and Jae lying in their dorm watching a movie for the fourth day in a row.

“How can you get tired of the person that makes you the happiest in the world?” I answered with a cutesy voice while looking at Jae with love in my eyes. Dowoon’s response was to make a disgusted sound and immediately walk out the dorm again, making me and Jae laugh until we couldn’t breathe. Even though I was trying to be funny in front of Dowoon, I wasn’t really lying when I said Jae makes me the happiest person in the world. There is something about being in his presence that makes me calm, like if I’m having a bad day and then meet up with Jae all the things that made me upset doesn’t matter anymore. Jae takes the pain away, he replaces the tears in my eyes with a smile on my lips.  

 

Whenever things seem to be too good to be true, they most likely are. The last year of college flew by, it went by so fast I didn’t even realise it was almost time to graduate. I applied for a few jobs at different newspapers and magazines across the country and thankfully a few of them wanted me to come on an interview. It was hard and tiring, but one day I got a phone call. It was the editor in chief of a big culture magazine in New York, who offered me a position as a writer and without even thinking twice I said yes, it was my dream job. The problems came later…

 

It was later during the dinner we had to celebrate me it came out, Jae had gotten a job offer at a music studio in LA that he already said yes to. At first he didn’t want to tell me why he didn’t seem to be to happy about me getting a job in New York, which I thought was very strange since he was the one to encourage me to apply, telling me it was a dream job and that they would be crazy not to hire me. Jae never told me he had been on an interview with the people from LA, he didn’t even tell me he had applied for a job there. During the time I had been stressing out over what to do after graduation, applying to jobs all over the country, Jae had seemed to not really care that much about his future. He kept on telling me that it will all sort itself out, that he could just follow me wherever I might be going. I didn’t think too much about it at the time, even though it didn’t really sound like the Jae that always had big plans about how he one day was going to own a record label, representing all the big artist, I didn’t think about anything than myself and my dreams. When Jae told me the news about his job, I felt ashamed about how I hadn’t really cared about what he wanted, but I also felt betrayed because he actually went behind my back with applying for a job that could affect our future together without talking to me about it. A part of me wanted to tell Jae that I could turn down the job offer in New York, that I could follow him to LA instead, it’s not like it’s an unknown city to me since I grew up there. The other part of me on the other hand was telling me that the job in New York was what I had dreamed about my whole life, that it’s an offer I can’t turn down. And like Jae could read my thoughts he said:

“I know that you are thinking about giving up the job in New York, and I can’t let you do that. I can’t let you do that just as much as I can’t give up the job I got in LA.”

I knew that he was right, that we couldn’t let our relationship get in the way of our careers, that we are way too young, in the beginning of the rest of our lives. If I got in the way of Jae becoming successful, making a name for himself,following his dreams I would never forgive myself, just as I know that he wouldn’t forgive himself if he came in the way for me.

 

Graduation day, the day we say goodbye came even though we didn’t want it to, but at the same time we had waited so long for it to finally arrive. To finally be free from school, even if it ment that we will be free from each other.

“Is this goodbye?” I ask as I lie next to Jae on his bed in his room filled with moving boxes. We have spent one last night together, trying to make the most of it, taking in each other's love and affection for the last time.

“I guess it is.” Jae sighs. I don’t say anything more, instead I turn towards Jae and kiss him softly on the lips as a tear makes its way down my cheek, before slipping out of bed and quickly put on my clothes again that Jae a few hours ago had ripped off. Jae doesn’t move, and I’m glad he doesn’t try to stop me, but I think we both realise it’s over, that we are over. Just before I walk out the door and leave Jae alone in the room in his big bed I turn around and out in the dark I whisper:

“Goodbye, I love you. Always have, always will.”

Before Jae has the chance to answer me I walk out the door, walking out on him and what we had. The tears stream down my face, but  know this is the only right thing to do, for the both of us. I know that I’m going to miss him so much, and that he is going to miss me, but I have to let him live his life, and he has to let me live mine. Maybe we will meet again someday, once we both have careers and then maybe we can try again, but for now it’s not our time. It hurts, but unfortunately it’s the truth.


	3. 10 years later

10 years later

 

It’s when I have flown out alone to Chicago to write an article about a singer for the paper I work for that we meet again. At the bar of the club holding the afterparty, owned by the hotel I’m staying at I spot the blond hair that is messier than ever, the rounded glasses that now have frames in silver instead of gold and the tattoo on the arm I saw get imprinted on the skin. For some reason I am not surprised Jae is here, it is the exact type of place he would be at. Music, a dark club and a lot variation among the crowd. And then I also knew that the singer I flew out here for is represented by the company I knew Jae once used to work for, so I had some hope that I might meet him here at the afterparty tonight. 

“Drinking solo tonight?” I say as I take a seat next to him. Jae looks at me, surprised a first but then the smile that I know so well spreads across his face.

“Not anymore it seems” he answers and calls the bartender over. 

Jae and I have a couple of drinks together, talking about the past, about us and what we used to be. The air is peaceful but still there is an undertone of tension, the tension of a question both of us don’t want to ask, but both know is inevitable. I noticed the ring on his finger as soon as I sat down, and I’m sure he noticed mine as well. The happiness in his eyes went away for a few seconds when he saw it, like he hoped to see something else. A lot can happen in ten years, of course we wouldn’t stay single forever, waiting for someone who might not be waiting back. Waiting for someone you deep down know you will never be with, you have to move one. Still a feeling of disappointment spreads in me, maybe I still had wished that he had waited for me, that he had believed that it was going to be us in the end all along. It’s a selfish thought, but I can’t help but to think it every time I see the ring on his finger. 

“So we both got married, huh?” Jae says, breaking the tension in his own way, not making it as awkward as it could have been. 

“Yeah, I guess we did.” I say and laugh a little and that’s it. We don’t ask questions about each others partner, because we don’t want to know. He doesn’t want to know who took the place that once was his, and I don’t want to know who took the place that a once mine. Jae doesn’t mention who has the other ring that belongs with his, he doesn’t mention how they met, or if the other person makes him happy, and I do the same. 

 

What I don’t mention to Jae is how only six months after we broke up, Park Sungjin was the assigned photographer to go with me to Seattle where I interviewed an upcoming author for an article for the magazine we both worked at. He wasn’t a stranger to me, I may have glanced over at him a couple of times whenever I saw him at the office, but not taken it further than that. His looks was astonishing, his black hair grown a little longer than what suited the hairstyle, always well dressed with his shirt neatly tucked in his pants. 

Sungjin had asked me out for drinks after we finished the interview and my first instinct had been to say no, but there was something about him that made me say yes instead. We ended up at a bar, discussing the works of big authors like Austen, Shakespeare and Hemingway. All sorts of books came up, from Moby Dick to Harry Potter, from Lord of the Flies to Alice in wonderland. Sungjin was well educated, a booknerd like me. He knew what he was talking about, impressive with all of his knowledge, yet he didn’t try to show off, it was just the way he was. Unaware of how attractive it made him, how his eyes sparkle when he talked about the books he loved, how he smiled as I agreed on his opinions, and how he made me laugh the evening through. When the bar was about to close he leaned in and gave me a kiss. I had answered it passionately, hungry from the lack of affection the last couple of months. The feeling of his kiss was not the same as I used to get with Jae, it’s something else. This is more mature, two adults who casually are on a date, not two drunk teenagers at a party. Me and Sungjin ended up at his hotel room that night, and I liked the feeling he gave me. The feeling of safety, even though we didn’t really know each other. The feeling of that he could give me something no one else ever had, how he filled me up with the feeling of greatness. 

 

What I also don’t mention is how three years later Sungjin and I were walking around Central Park one spring evening, discussing the exhibition we just been at, when he out of nowhere pulled out a neatly wrapped present of the inside of his coat. Sungjin often gave me little gifts, mostly books or photographs he knew that I would like. We sat down on a bench so I could open the present that was a black leather book, but without any writing what so ever on the cover. Confused over what kind of book it was, I had opened it, only to on the first page discover a quote from one of my favourite books; Pride and Prejustice;  _ "In vain I have struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you."  _ Then when I flipped the page there was another quote from Wuthering Heights;  _ “Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.” _  The whole book was filled of love quotes from all of both mine and his favourite books, it was the most beautiful gift Sungjin had ever given me, the most beautiful gift anyone had ever given me. When I got to the last page and I teary eyed looked up on Sungjin, he suddenly got up and kneeled down in front of me, pulling out a black velvet box of his pocket. There was no hesitation in me at all when I screamed yes and threw myself into his arms. The tears had rolled down my cheeks as he had put the ring on my finger and I was the happiest person alive. I loved Sungjin with the whole of my heart, wanting to spend the rest of my life with him, wanting to build a family with him, wanting to grow old together with him, and him only. 

We got married five months later, making me a Park, not a Park as in Jae Park as I once believe I would be, but a Park as in Park Sungjin, and I couldn't be happier. Sungjin gave me everything I wanted in life, his love was like a drug I couldn’t be without. 

 

What I also don’t mention is how even though I love Sungjin over anything else, how Sungjin is the love of my life, my soulmate, I occasionally still think of Jae. It might be while I’m driving home from work, remembering how we used to take road trips with the windows down, screaming the lyrics to whatever song that was playing. I might be when I drink coffee and suddenly get flashbacks from the time Jae dropped his iced coffee over his white shirt and I couldn’t stop laughing at him. It might be when I am getting ready for bed, and I get reminded of how Jae used to hug me from behind, resting his chin on my shoulder as I brushed my teeth. How whenever Jae pops up in my mind, my heart hurts a little from how much I missed him and what we used to be, even though it has been years and a feeling of shame always follows the heartache. My heart doesn’t belong to Jae anymore, but why does it still hurt at the thought of him?

  
  
  


“Do you think we could have made it if we had tried harder? If we fought harder?” I ask, even though I know it is wrong. Me and Jae are over, we have new partners now, there is nothing we can do to change what happened in the past. Jae looks at me, not answering straight away, thinking of the right answer that doesn’t exist.

“No, I think we had our time together, and that was all the time we were supposed to have.”

I nod, saying that I agree, because I do, but still it why does it make me sad? Maybe it is that I don’t want to give up on the young love that I, that we once had. 

“I still miss you sometimes though” I confess, looking down at my empty glass, not quite sure how I want Jae to react to my words. 

“Yeah, I miss you too sometimes” he says, making me look up and meet his eyes. The air around us change as soon as our eyes meet, going from friendly to tense, a type of tension that isn’t new at all. We both feel it, feel how it tries to drag us together and we both want it to.

“My room, our yours?” Jae asks and grabs my hand as he stands up. We run to the elevator like two teenagers, pretending that we still are as young as we were ten years ago. 

 

The night in Jae’s hotel room is spent with him on top of me, our bodies intertwining, becoming one. It’s all like it used to, it still gives me the same euphoric feeling, and how I’ve missed it. But then later, as I lay in his arms I realise that this is the last time this is ever going to happen, the last night I will ever spend with Jae. It had felt so good, like it used to, and that’s the problem. It was exactly like it used to, passionate and wild, like we were young and unstoppable, but we aren’t young anymore, that time is by. We cannot keep on living on the old feelings, wishing things were like they one used to. I know that I am too old for that now, that Jae isn’t the one I am going to live the rest of my life with. I have a husband now that I love deeply, someone whose feelings for me are mature, and the same goes for my feelings towards him. When I first fell in love with Jae during High School I was a completely different person than I am now, and Jae is not the same person he once was. It’s nothing strange, it’s just how life is, and we might not like it, but it’s the truth. 

“You feel it too?” I whisper with my face towards Jae’s chest.

“Yeah… I do.” 

That’s all that have to be said, because we both understand what will happen later, once we get out of this bed. Once we get out of this bed we will get dressed, kiss each other goodbye for the last time and then I will leave. I will fly back home to Sungjin, the man who now owns my heart and I will pretend like nothing ever happened, like I ever met Jae this weekend on this work trip. Jae will probably do the same, fly home to his partner and pretend like nothing. I don’t mind though, I don’t mind that the tiny bit of hope I used to have that me and Jae were going to be together again is gone. I don’t mind because I know it wasn’t meant to be, and at least now instead of heartache whenever I see something that reminds me of Jae I can smile and remember the old days when he was the one who used to make me happy. 


End file.
